Page 28 of Flirt
CHAPTER NINE
Stepping into Swerve onFriday night felt like navigating a minefield.
Cameron had been to the club dozens of times, but he’d never arrived with Asher. Maybe it was his imagination, but he swore every head in the place swiveled toward them, all eyes locked on their intertwined hands.
“Everyone is staring,” he muttered.
“So? Let them stare.” With a wicked grin, Asher jerked him forward and planted a kiss on him that curled his toes. “Now, they have something to talk about, too.”
“You’re insane.” Still, he laughed, and some of the tension eased out of his shoulders. “I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.”
After the movie, Asher had walked him back to his guest suite, kissed him chastely, then left. With anyone else, he would have been relieved to take things slowly, but nothing about his new relationship with the writer was usual. Disappointed and horny, he’d climbed into bed—which had been just as comfortable as he’d imagined—and drifted off quickly.
He’d hoped to wake up the next morning to the smell of freshly brewed coffee, but instead, he’d been rousedquite rudely by the harsh blare of a smoke detector. So much for Asher making him breakfast.
After that, the rest of the day had been a blur.
They’d gone out for breakfast at a cute little diner in Asher’s neighborhood, then he’d been whisked downtown to the Galleria for a shopping trip that still made his head spin when he thought about it. In the middle of it all, he’d apparently lost his damn mind, because by the time they’d left the mall, he’d had half a dozen bags of new clothes he never would have bought on his own.
Still, it had been a good day. He’d laughed more than he had in years, and while they’d done no more than kiss and hold hands, he couldn’t get enough of Asher. He was just so…alive, and everything with him felt like an adventure, even trying on ridiculously overpriced sunglasses.
The only blight on the day had happened when he’d asked a salesclerk for the price on a sterling silver watch that hadn’t been marked. When she’d sneered at him and told him that if he had to ask then he probably couldn’t afford it, he’d wanted to sink under the nearest chair and disappear. Asher, however, hadn’t been impressed with her snooty attitude.
“Oh, honey, I can definitely afford it,”he’d told her.“And do you know why I can afford it? Because I don’t overpay for flashy trinkets.”Then, he had looked her up and down likesomething found on the bottom of his shoe.“Orcheapservice.”
It had been the sexiest thing ever, and Cameron had been hard for the rest of the day.
Oh, and he’d gotten the watch at a forty-percent discount.
“Relax,” Asher breathed next to his ear as he squeezed his hand. “You look amazing.”
Cameron didn’t respond, nor did he relax, but he did manage a tight smile.
The artfully ripped jeans Asher had chosen for him molded to his thighs and cupped his balls. He still had no idea how he’d been convinced to spend so much money on a pair of jeans with holes in them, but he had to admit they made his ass look amazing. The shirt he wore was another matter entirely. The pale blue V-neck flattered his complexion, and brought out the color of his eyes, but he could have gotten the same thing at Target instead of paying almost two-hundred dollars because of the designer label on it.
Asher had been insistent, though. So much in fact, he’d paid for the shirt himself when Cameron rejected the idea of wasting that kind of money on one article of clothing.
“I’m still going to pay you back.” They’d had a heated argument about it over lunch that had ended in Asherkissing him until he’d forgotten why he’d been angry in the first place. The charmer couldn’t distract him forever.
“Okay,” Asher answered easily, but there was a glint of challenge in his eyes. “Dance or drink?”
“I don’t dance.”
“Don’t or can’t?”
“Don’t.” It didn’t really take much skill to grind on someone. He’d just always been too self-conscious to dance with strangers that way.
Asher smirked, then leaned in close to ghost his lips over the hollow just behind his ear. “You do tonight.”
Cameron shivered. He could say no, but with Asher’s mouth on him, he couldn’t really think of a good reason why. “In that case, I’m going to need a drink first. Maybe three.”
~
“Oh, I love thissong!” Springing off his barstool, Cameron grabbed Asher’s hand and pulled him toward the dance floor. “Let’s dance.”
Drunk Cameron was fucking cute as hell, and his excitement proved too contagious to ignore. Honestly, Asher hadn’t thought the guy had it in him to let loose and have fun. It had taken two hours and six shots of tequila, but the results were well worth the wait.
If the man wanted to dance, he wasn’t about to argue.
